Sunday, March 19, 2017

“To
be or not to be – that is the question” is the very famous line from the play
Hamlet. Hamlet is contemplating suicide, and this phrase, according to
philosopher Schopenhauer “is, in
condensed form, that our state is so wretched that complete non-existence would
be decidedly preferable to it.”

Nagarjuna,
the proponent of the concept of “Sunyata”
refuted all logical combination of ‘being’ and ‘non-being’. His
reasoning was that the two states are the result of concepts from a rational
mind and true reality has to have a ground state beyond the mind.

In a
recent talk the great Vietnam Buddhist monk, Thich
Nhat Hahn, clarified that the origin of the classification of the
state of being and non- being as purely related to human existence. He said:

“If
we are caught in the notion of being we will also be caught in the notion of
non-being. From the perspective of life span, we think we start to exist at the
point of time we call birth; and we think we continue to exist until the point
of time we call death, after which we think we cease to exist. Thus the notions
of birth and death form the basis of the notions of being and non-being.”

From
a cosmological perspective, in his famous book “A
Brief History of Time”, Stephen Hawkingargues that quantum mechanics shows us that the
classical picture of a “well-defined spacetime arises as a limiting case of the
quantum perspective.” Time is less fundamental than space and, as a
consequence, spacetime cannot have a singular, initial boundary. There is no
singularity, no initial boundary at all; the universe has no beginning! Even
though unbounded, the universe is finite. Here is how Hawking sets forth his
view:

“The
quantum theory of gravity has opened up a new possibility, in which there would
be no boundary to space-time and so there would be no need to specify the
behaviour at the boundary. One could say: ‘The boundary condition of the
universe is that it has no boundary.’ The universe would be completely
self-contained and not affected by anything outside itself. It would neither be
created nor destroyed. It would just BE.”

Hence
the concept of being is intimately correlated with time and hence our post Big
Bang dualistic concept of Being and Non-being.

But
embedded within the fundamental substrate of all creation is the first
principle or cause which is time independent and hence eternal from a temporal
perspective and all manifested realm is spatial-temporal and hence have a very
limited reality. This principle which is the cause is hence eternal but the
effect is temporal. To the human mind the definition of this first principle is
called ‘desire’ or ‘longing’.

In
the macrostructure we can relate this cause and effect through an allegory to
the great ocean which has great tranquillity and extended existence but the
moment it meets a boundary, which we can equate to the Big Bang spatial
boundary, waves, estuaries and shorelines are created, The essence of the ocean
by its innate nature is to spread to find equilibrium but this desire is realized at the boundary condition as a different manifestation.

From
a western mystical tradition, the German Cobbler mystic, Jacob Boehmesaid:

“the
basis of the world is nonbeing... because the beginning [of the world] is
desire, longing, and only an absolute vacuum can have longing. A vacuum,
nonbeing, can by longing draw or attract into itself.. something exceedingly
positive because it creates the world.” ……C.G. Jung,
Visions, Vol.1, p.524-5

Vacuum
Boehme refers to is perhaps akin to the Lurianic Kabbalist notion of
‘tzimtzum’: contraction that proceeds emanation. Again resorting to the ocean
analogy, when there is a great pressure generated deep within the ocean floor
due to an earthquake, the innate pressure tries to find expression as a
propagating sub-surface pressure differential. When this pressure differential
reaches near the shore, first there is a great contraction of the shoreline and
then a very huge tsunami wave created. The creation of our universe is very
similar. We are in the forefront of this travelling wave which due its rapid
expansion (cosmological theory of inflation) will dissipate all its energy and
return to the equilibrium. This in Vedic philosophy is called Pralaya.

Our
understanding of Tzimtzum can be clarified through an analogy from the world of
mathematics. An infinite perfect mind sees immediately that the arithmetical
expressions (21/3), (126/18), (6.72 + .28), etc., etc., are all equivalents of
the number 7: it is only from the point of view of a limited intellect that
these expressions appear to represent different mathematical ideas. Indeed, as
the mathematical philosophers Bertrand Russell
and Alfred NorthWhitehead
painstakingly demonstrated, all of mathematics is predicated on a very small
number of logical axioms, and an infinite mind would in an instant intuit the
entire world of higher mathematical construct as an amplification of the
simplest of ideas. So it is with the world. It is a multifarious manifestation
of unique singular principle which only the Divine intellect can comprehend.

We
are a small effect of the Divine cause which pervades all creation and all
universes. Let us enjoy this ride with the assurance that one day we will transcend
this temporal manifestation and merge with the Divine reality.

No comments
:

Post a Comment

AUTHOR

Click on image to read author's profile

SOCIAL NETWORK LINKS

PAGE VIEWS

TRANSLATE

COMMENT MODERATION

"The author moderates all comments with the goal of facilitating an informed, substantive, civil conversation about the research developments we cover. Comments that are abusive, profane, self-promotional, misleading, incoherent or off-topic will be rejected. We can only accept comments that are written in English."

SEARCH THIS BLOG

FOLLOW BY EMAIL

PURPOSE OF THE BLOG

The purpose of the Blog is to provide on a regular basis thought provoking inputs which would aid in deeper seeking of truth within individuals.The aim of the author is to look at art, poetry and literature to find hidden messages which the great thinkers, spiritual leaders, poets, sculptors and painters had subtly built into their work.These works, when confronted, touches the very soul of men and women and unleashes a flood of emotions bordering on the surreal.This Blog would not serve its purpose without your active participation in terms of providing comments, which would be enriching to the whole community of seekers who regularly look at these pages for empowering nuggets of wisdom.

FACEBOOK

FOLLOWERS

DECLARATION

The basic contents of the Blog are the personal opinion of the author. Some elements that enhance the value of the thoughts presented (themes, pictures, video, podcast etc.,) have been chosen from public domain to the best of knowledge of the author.

A rich resource ambiance is provided to enable readers to relate to the textual and idea content more readily.